The general trend in corporate network management is the addition of mobility of users of the corporate network. Whereas traditional corporate networks have included a LAN and local desktop devices, the recent trend has been the introduction of mobile devices, such as smart phones, that are used by employees to work and access corporate resources remotely. While allowing users to work remotely is desirable within an organization, from an IT perspective the mobility of users can present certain challenges.
A common challenge in organizations that allow mobile access to users is the need for reliable security solutions. For example, users within an organization may use several different platforms for accessing resources within a network. Users may use smart phones, such as Blackberries, iPhones, and Android devices, tablet computing devices, such as iPads or similar offerings with other mobile operating systems, laptops, or home desktops. The diversity of devices and operating systems employed by these devices can make it difficult to ensure security when users access computing resources within an organization's network. Furthermore, as mobile devices become more powerful and ubiquitous, users typically utilize a single device for both business and pleasure. Device users demand the ability to customize their devices, including their own personal preferences, data, and applications—many of which may be counter to the security or management goals of an organization.
Unlike traditional network management where devices share common operating system features, such as a network of desktops that all use a common Microsoft Windows operating system, mobile devices often utilize different operating systems, each of which may have different capabilities from a management and security standpoint. For example, for the last decade, corporate users commonly used Blackberry devices from Research in Motion (“RIM”), which allowed uniform remote access to status information and some actions via the Blackberry Enterprise Server (“BES”). New popular devices, such as those from Apple and manufactures that utilize Android and Windows Mobile, approach management and security differently, providing differing levels of out-of-the box management functionality. As these devices become part of the corporate ecosystem, IT managers are taxed with managing and/or providing security against threats related to a spectrum of devices. It is generally infeasible for most IT managers to develop expertise in each of the different rapidly-changing mobile platforms to manage these devices. There remains a need to simplify the management and configuration of these mobile devices by an IT manager.